Comments on: Cash for clunkers: a bad idea and a false promisehttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/
Politics and policy from inside WashingtonTue, 14 Oct 2014 12:57:43 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=3.8.3By: Greghttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1498
Fri, 07 Aug 2009 20:17:23 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1498Just wanted to post up the following quote from a yahoo finance article on people’s experience with the “Cash for Clunkers” program. It clearly supports my position that most clunker participants would have purchased a used vehicle.

I think that it is very clear that the clunkers program will not necessairly bring new auto sales forward, but will certainly impact used car sales. I believe this respondents position is fairly common.

“Officials expect a quarter-million gas guzzlers will be junked under the original $1 billion set aside by Congress — money that is now all but exhausted.

Calculations by The Associated Press, using Department of Transportation figures, show that replacing those fuel hogs will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by just under 700,000 tons a year. While that may sound impressive, it’s nothing compared to what the U.S. spewed last year: nearly 6.4 billion tons (and that was down from previous years).

That means on average, every hour, America emits 728,000 tons of carbon dioxide. The total savings per year from cash for clunkers translates to about 57 minutes of America’s output of the chief greenhouse gas.” AP Press

Effectively, your kids and your kids children will be paying for this joke of an idea for years to come. That is a lot more than change…

]]>By: Daniel Loncehttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1415
Thu, 06 Aug 2009 13:58:18 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1415I propose a CASH-FOR-WINDOWS program; smash all the old windows in America (to save the planet of course) and give everyone 4,500$ to buy new planet-saving windows. Or how about this one CASH-FOR-REFRIGERATORS; Destroy all Fridges older than 2 years and give everyone 1000$ to buy a new one to save the planet. Just think what these subsidies would do for the construction and manufacturing industries! Don\’t worry about the cost it will save us so much money, in fact we will install a new program, make money by destroying what you have and buy new. How about CASH-for-COATS, destroy all of the old energy-inefficient coats, give 500$ for NEW Coats that people could wear to turn down the thermostat,(save the planet). Great Ideas,I could get elected to Office.
]]>By: Markhttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1389
Wed, 05 Aug 2009 18:21:13 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1389From reading all the comments, I conclude that liberals live life based on feelings, not on truth, facts and common sense; whereas conservatives argue on facts, and often times they hurt the feelings of liberals.
]]>By: Benhttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1346
Wed, 05 Aug 2009 03:05:31 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1346Just remember everyone: TANSTAAFL.
]]>By: the Shahhttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1303
Tue, 04 Aug 2009 20:35:49 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1303I think this constant hammering over the head of cash-for-clunkers, based on one ridiculous report, sponsored by neo-cons, really shows the mentality of neo-cons in America. They complain that not enough is being done NOW, but here is a program that is making something happen NOW (while maybe at the expense of sales spaced out of the next few years) and neo-cons waste no time in crapping all over it. Worse yet, all they do is scream bloody-murder, or in their parlance Obamanomics, and don’t offer anything that comes close to a reasonable, viable alternative – other than the vague cry of slash taxes and spending that is rather meaningless and frankly pointless.

Unless you are going to offer constructive criticism, leave the jabs on the side. I think VP Biden said it best during the campaign, to paraphrase ‘if you want to trash talk someone as policy, at least have the balls to say it to their face or GTFO’. And if all you can offer is one report that over-states the obvious, that’s a shame. It’s like the person who doesn’t believe in climate-change because on average the temp is .1F lower than last year, ignoring though that there were record highs in the summer and record lows in the winter that ‘averaged out’ to lower overall, barely. Think about it, and think how that may help politics in America (and the environment) in general.

]]>By: The Real Dealhttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1301
Tue, 04 Aug 2009 20:31:16 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1301Wow, ran out of money after a few days of the mighty Cash for Clunker program.

Free-lunch, bribery, and lousy economics do work. In America, that is. I give up. Join ‘em when you can’t fight ‘em. Therefore:

- I need Cash for TV program. See, my many tube TVs in the attic (including a 12″ washing machine model of 1950) is bad for environment and jobs. How about $1000 for each big fat flat panel TV I buy? No TV are made in the USA anymore? Well, most flat panel TVs are made in Mexico by the mighty Japanese electronics giants, imported under NAFTA rules. That should be good for American economy.

- I need Cash for Mortgage program. Need I say more? For every mortgage outstanding, the Gov should offer $10,000 for $100,000 of mortgage. 10% just like C4C. And let’s no discriminate subprime – every mortgage should qualify. Boy this should fix up the economy like real fast.

- What’s good is a car without gas? So I need a Cash for Gas program. For every dollar on gas I should get a rebate check of 43.3854 cents. (The math is complicated involving proprietary knowledge.) Let’s go rolling on C4C cars and C4G fuel!

Yes, there is sunshine, there is a God after all. For a while I thought Anglo-Sexton hyper-capitalism trickle-down economics is dead after Wall Street got its belly full of TARP. Now my faith is restored by the Cash for People economics. Free money trickling down to little old me! Bernanke, you do fly helicopter after all!! Karl Marx and Mussolini love you.

]]>By: Chrishttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1294
Tue, 04 Aug 2009 20:15:44 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1294Republicans like to say “No” a lot.
]]>By: DanOhttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1220
Tue, 04 Aug 2009 17:07:34 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-12202001 we get 0% on cars. 1999 I bought a car at 0%. Thats been around a long time and really big rebates have too. This comes back to pricing being out of step with what people are willing to pay…Therefore by spending tons of money on advertising and fire sales (expense expense expense) tax code and accounting gimmicks kick in and money is made anyway. SO Mr. smart eco geek, you sit there with your charts and graphs trying to prove a negative. My gas guzzler clunker qualifies to a pretty good bonus. But I ain’t biting. Retail price is too high, and I (above median) will buy one of these rebated cars in a couple years used green and still shiney. In the meantime, if we get a recovery with jobs…entirely possible with the coming paradigm shift toward populist ideals, maybe I will buy. The leaders have thir heads up and are looking around unlike the last admin with their heads up their…er, in the sand!
]]>By: StevenKshttp://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/08/04/cash-for-clunkers-a-bad-idea-and-a-false-promise/comment-page-1/#comment-1214
Tue, 04 Aug 2009 16:46:20 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/?p=1383#comment-1214I guess I don’t understand the math on this. If both the 16.1m & 21.7m are annualized rates, then the annualized increase is 34.78%.